The review / benchmark work I've seen - don't recall where - said "nope, not much difference at all".
There's always some corner case - multithreaded video en/de code kinda stuff - where memory bandwidth makes a big difference. Those aren't what I do.
I think multithreading is still young in most apps I use, and the lack of multiple core support keeps the memory bandwidth problem minor. Windows 8, and better dev tools, will help, but that's a ways off.
The boards use 2 not 3 channels for memory because, first, IIRC the memory controller in non-original i7 chips, and lower, only take 2 channels, and second, 2 is cheaper than 3, allowing these boards to go 'mainstream', and 3, it takes less memory to populate the system, lowering the cost.
The I/O on these things still sucks anyhow, and they're still the system bottleneck. Cable modem crawls ...
Just my opinion. I could be, and have been, wrong.
Merry Christmas,
rr
